


serpent heart

by thecatonlyknows



Category: The Dragon Prince (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Torture, Canon-Typical Violence, Enemies to Lovers, F/F, For Want of a Nail, Imprisonment, Slow Burn, if that's a thing?, just like the things that happened to runaan might also happen here etc
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-19
Updated: 2019-03-03
Packaged: 2019-10-31 10:52:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17848082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thecatonlyknows/pseuds/thecatonlyknows
Summary: O serpent heart, hid with a flowering face!Did ever dragon keep so fair a cave?...After the assasination of King Harrow, Runaan escapes, and Rayla is captured in his place. Claudia is put in charge of overseeing their new prisoner; the task proves more difficult than she had originally imagined.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So here's my disclaimer: I post infrequently, to no particular schedule, and have a track record of abandoning fics whenever I start to lose interest in them. You have been warned.

Claudia likes Callum, she really does - his adorable nose! the way he squeaks when he falls over! - but he’s never exactly struck her as the sort of person she’d want to rely on in a crisis. The list of people Claudia wants to rely on in a crisis are, in short order, 1. her father, 2. her brother (as long as the crisis in question is relatively straightforward and therefore the sort that can be solved by the correct leveraging of well-toned muscle and nothing else), and 3. the famous Sir Finias Curse, greatest explorer of Katolis and hero of her favorite bedtime stories as a girl.  
  
Unfortunately, none of those people are here right now - her father and brother are somewhere upstairs, and Sir Finias Curse has been dead these three centuries past. Even more unfortunately, Callum is here, adorable nose and all. Along with Ezran, Ezran’s pet glowtoad, and the crisis itself in the form of a glowering elven assassin with pale narrowed eyes and a pair of sharp-looking blades grasped tightly in both four-fingered hands.  
      
“It’s not a weapon,” the elf is bleating about the dragon egg, pointing one of those swords directly at Claudia as she does. “It’s an egg!” Claudia doesn’t waste her time listening to the lie; she’s more concerned with the way both princes somehow seem to buy it. Neither of them can be in his right mind, given the way they’re both willingly standing within swordreach of the elf instead of running for safety while they have the chance. Whatever the elf has done to them, though, Claudia’s ready to bet she and her father can undo it.  
  
“Ezran, don’t be afraid. Walk towards me, and if she moves even an inch—“ Claudia sketches out the rune instead of finishing her threat, letting the brilliant hum of the summoned lightning speak for her. “Just bring that thing here.”  
  
“It’s not a thing!” the elf interrupts again. “It has a mother, and it needs to go back to her.”  
  
“You’re right,” Ezran says suddenly. “It wants its mother.”  
  
Claudia shifts forward an inch, grinding her teeth. “Ezran be _careful_ ,” she says, as the boy looks down at the gleaming egg in his hands, then back to the elf’s tattooed face. She keeps her own eyes fixed on the elf’s weapons, heart-stoppingly close to Ezran’s bare neck. It would take less than a second for blood to be spilled.  
  
The moment stretches out taut as a harp string. Claudia has just enough time to register the sinking feeling in her stomach when Ezran’s expression firms, and he looks again at the assassin with resolve in his green eyes. “Follow me.”  
  
Quick as a jackrabbit, the boy turns and dashes down the hall, with the elf close on his heels.  
  
“Don’t worry,” Claudia tells Callum, who so far has not exactly been helpful with this crisis - she knows he’s not much for swordsmanship, but surely Soren taught him enough to know it’s bad when the murderous elven assassin is holding a weapon and you’re not? - but has also, look on the bright side! yet to actively make the situation worse. “I won’t hit Ez.” The lightning she summoned sparks against her palm, biting hungrily at her skin as it waits for release.  
  
Just as she’s about to speak the word, something makes her eyes flick to the side. Callum’s face - usually so easy to read - has turned to a battleground of conflicting emotions, but he hesitates just long enough for Claudia to realize he’s about to step towards her.  
  
There’s no time to think, so Claudia doesn’t - she just skips two steps forward out of the prince’s reach. A moment later, Callum’s hand stretches out as he tries and fails to knock the primal stone from Claudia’s grasp. Claudia jabs an elbow into his side, keeps her eyes fixed on the elf’s quickly retreating back, and snaps out “Fulmenis!” as she clenches her fist to send the lightning slicing like a blade down the stone hall.  
  
It strikes the elf directly in the back.  
  
“No!” Ezran wails, running to the assassin’s side. Somewhere behind her Callum is gasping and staggering to regain his balance.  
  
Claudia ignores them both, for now. The elf has fallen. The princes are safe, and so is the egg. That means the day is saved - or at least Claudia’s part of it.  
  
So for just a second, she lets herself breathe out a long, quiet sigh of relief. She doesn’t want to imagine how terribly things might have gone if her spell had missed.  
  
The next time there’s a crisis, she dearly hopes it happens when Callum is far, far away.  
..  
  
The rest of the day is awful.  
  
Claudia has to physically wrangle the egg out of Ezran’s hands to put it back in its hiding place, causing his eyes to fill up with tears and Callum to stare at her like she was the one plotting to murder a ten-year-old instead of the elf laid out unconcious on the floor. Both princes keep trying to _talk her out of it_ as she does, and Claudia is starting to think she’d better have her father check in on just what kind of subjects the princes’ tutors have been teaching them, because she’s never heard so many ridiculous historical inaccuracies spouted in one place before in her entire life.  
      
“Claudia, you don’t understand,” Callum says for the fifth time, and Claudia is tired and worried and busy and can finally feel her temper start to snap.  
  
“No, Callum,” she says, her voice sharp enough to make him flinch back, “ _You_ don’t understand. Do you even know what you almost did today? Do you have any idea how much danger you put your brother in? You put _all of Katolis_ in?”  
  
“No, we were trying to _help_ —the elf wasn’t going to hurt Ezran—I mean, she was, but then she changed her mind! That’s the whole point! The egg—“  
  
“That’s _enough_ , Callum,” Claudia says, dusting off her hands as she rises from the vault and turns to frown at him. He withers a little under the look, but not as much as she’d expected. “You can’t tell anyone about the egg being here. Do _you_ understand _me_? If anyone else finds out about this, the entire kingdom is at risk.”  
  
“But—“  
  
“No more buts,” she snaps, then briefly wishes Soren was here to laugh with her about the phrasing. But now isn’t the time. “Take Ez and find the guards who were supposed to escort you to the winter lodge. It isn’t safe for either of you here.”  
  
Callum just keeps staring at her, as if she’s someone he’s never met before in his life. Ezran, who has gone eerily quiet since she wrestled the egg away from him, is looking at her the same way. It gives her an unpleasant, squirmy feeling in the pit of her stomach, like that time she swallowed a jar of Father’s enchanted earthworms when she was eight because Soren had said she wouldn’t dare. She doesn’t like the sensation anymore now than she did then.  
  
“What about her?” Callum asks at last, and she doesn’t have to look to know he’s talking about the elf.  
  
Claudia rolls her neck to get out the kinks, then straightens up. “You don’t need to worry about her anymore,” she tells them both. “ _I’ll_ take care of her.”  
  
And she does. The princes huddle together in the hallway, watching as she levitates the elf’s body and floats it at her side to the deepest and dankest of her father’s cells, where she locks it in with a loud clang.  
  
Then she has to escort Callum and Ezran back up to the normal levels of the castle; she doesn’t trust them to find their guards on their own right now, so she doesn’t let them out of her sight until she’s delivered them to Marcos and convinced he has them in hand.  
  
She reaches the king’s chambers just in time to see the last of the elven assassins catapult himself over the edge of the balcony, barely dodging the sword that Soren sent whistling over his head just a centimeter too high.  
  
The other elves are dead or dying on the floor around her. So is Hanna, and Giorgos, and Malia, and—  
  
So is the king.  
  
But Claudia can’t think about that right now. There are too many other things to do, and Father wouldn’t want her to be weak, would tell her to save her tears and focus on something useful. She tries to think of something useful.  
  
 Beside her, Soren lets out a shuddering breath and lowers his sword. He’s bleeding from a long scratch on his arm and looks even more exhausted than she feels. “It’s over,” he says quietly.  
  
Claudia puts a hand on his shoulder and squeezes. She doesn’t say anything. She can’t think of a single useful word.  
  
Afterwards, she wants nothing more than to throw herself into bed and sleep for a year. But she knows she can’t, not yet. First she has to go back to the dungeons to clean up and make certain that _no one else_ has been nosing around in her father’s secrets besides the princes. She would rather stay with her brother, but she knows that Father would tell her that protecting the High Mage’s concerns - which are the concerns of all Katolis, even if the kingdom doesn’t know it - is more important.    
  
By the time the elf is properly chained up and she’s made sure the secret passage is secure, the assassin is starting to wake. She peers blearily up at Claudia from behind slitted eyes as Claudia slides the last cuff into place. “You…”  
  
“That’s right,” Claudia agrees in a sing-song voice, brushing off her hands on her skirt as she takes a step back. Ugh, moonshadow elf cooties, she’ll need to soak in her bath for at least a week to feel clean again. “ _Me_.”  
  
The elf jerks back to life, throwing her weight against the restraints and making the chains clatter - but they hold. Of course they do; Claudia locked them in place herself. “Let me go!” the prisoner hisses, the burr of her accent twisting the words into something almost unintelligible. “You don’t know what you’re doing, that egg—“  
  
Claudia sighs loudly. “Why do people keep telling me that today?” she asks, then holds up a hand. “No, no, don’t answer that. The point is, I do know. I know exactly what I’m doing. Just like you did, when you broke in here to murder the king and the princes.”  
  
The elf seems to come back to herself now, going still once more as she watches Claudia with those sharp, sharp eyes. She opens her mouth as if to say something, then shuts it.  
  
Claudia crosses her arms. There’s an ember of flickering anger growing hotter and fiercer inside her with every second she keeps staring down at the bruised, dirty face of her kingdom’s mortal enemy. Her hands are still shaking slightly - she’s never seen so many dead bodies before, not ever - so she tucks them against her elbows to keep the elf from noticing. “What’s that? You have something to say?”  
  
“No.”  
  
“Really?” She raises an eyebrow. “Not going to try to defend yourself, elf? I don’t know what lies you told Ezran and Callum, but I promise you, my father and I aren’t so gullible.”  
  
The elf’s mouth tightens in a sneer. “Your father is a monster, a liar and a thief. And you’re no better, human.”  
  
The faces of the corpses of the King’s Guard she’d had to step over to reach the door keep flashing in front of Claudia’s eyes. She blinks to clear them, then smiles unpleasantly back. Looks like someone’s a little confused about who the monster is here. “Those are pretty bold words, coming from a vile, bloodthirsty elven assassin. Your friends are all dead, by the way. You might want to change your tune if you don’t want to join them.”  
  
For just a moment, the elf’s mouth tightens, and Claudia could almost imagine she saw something like grief slicing across that strange, tattooed face. Then she closes her eyes, and when she opens them again there’s nothing in them but defiance. “I’m already dead,” she bites out.  
  
Claudia feels her own smile fade away. “We’ll see about that.” Then she turns to go. She lets the cell door clang loudly shut behind her.


	2. Chapter 2

The next few days are a busy blur in Claudia’s mind. There’s King Harrow’s funeral to get through, along with the funeral rites for all the guards who fell defending him, and of course Soren needs help with the paperwork generated by losing so many members of his Crownguard in combat - and then on top of it all there’s the bodies of the four moonshadow assassins to dispose of; her father shows her how to collect samples of the hair and horns before sending them away to be burnt. Luckily Claudia has always had a strong stomach.   
  
General Amaya shows up on the second day with the princes in tow. On the one hand it’s a relief that there’s someone here to look after them now - Claudia just hasn’t had the time to think about them yet, let alone to check in on them now they’re back - but on the other hand, having the general around also makes her father so cranky. And Amaya has never liked Claudia or her brother very much, anyway; Claudia knows she argued against Soren being appointed captain of the Crownguard, though Harrow overruled her in the end.   
  
She doesn’t mention this to Soren over breakfast, even though she’s pretty sure he already knows. Instead she just tells him his bedhead looks like a porcupine butt and offers him a cup of her hot brown morning potion while he’s still sputtering.   
  
“It’s artfully tousled, Claudia,” he says, though he still accepts the cup.   
  
“Porcupine butts can be tousled.”  
  
“Uh, pretty sure they can’t.”  
  
“Uh, pretty sure they caa-an,” she sing-songs back, then reaches across the table to muss up his hair even more to prove her point.   
  
“You’re a porcupine butt,” Soren grumbles. It’s pretty weak as comebacks go, and Claudia eyes him skeptically as he takes a half-hearted bite of toast. It’s rare for Soren to do anything half-heartedly when it comes to food.   
  
“Are you feeling alright, Sor-bear?”  
  
“Fine,” he mumbles through a mouthful of toast. “Just…tired. I have to talk to Hanna’s husband today about her death benefits. Hope their kid doesn’t cry this time.” He chews tiredly. “Maybe he’ll leave her home for once.”   
  
Claudia feels her mouth purse as she looks at him. Soren had liked Hanna, she knows. The older guardswoman always beat Soren at darts, and Claudia remembered her brother telling her that Hanna had finally promised to teach him the trick to it the next time they went out drinking together. But Soren would never learn it now.     
  
“Will you have any free time tomorrow?” she asks suddenly. What Soren really needs is a distraction - something useful to do with himself that doesn’t involve sitting around scratching his signature onto page after page of parchment or talking about annual sums with a widower and his crying kid. Her brother isn’t normally the type to brood, but he gets depressed if you leave him alone for too long with no physical activity. He’s kind of like a horse that way - a healthy Soren requires three meals a day, regular exercise, and a light enough hand on the reins to let him think the whole thing was his own idea in the first place. Luckily for him, Claudia happens to be an excellent horsewoman. “I’m planning to go into the woods to collect a few spell components, and I could use the company.”  
  
Soren frowns. “You probably shouldn’t be going to the woods by yourself so soon after the attack. It’s not safe.”  
  
Claudia lets the corner of her mouth tilt up into a smile. “Well then I guess you have to come with me, Sor-bear. I’ll see you in the courtyard tomorrow at two. Don’t be late!”  
  
“Fine, fine…” Soren waves a distracted hand and returns his attention to his toast. Claudia sighs, and picks at her own meal with a similar lack of enthusiasm.  
  
As for herself, on the bright side, she doesn’t have to talk to any widowers or crying children today, phew! But on the not-so-bright side, she does have to attend to the care and feeding of one bloodthirsty elven prisoner currently locked up in her father’s dungeon.  
  
Claudia only visited the elf once on the day of the king’s funeral, when she had refused to eat and tried to kick the bowl of porridge out of Claudia’s hands; years of dodging Soren’s surprise-attacks meant that Claudia’s reflexes were sharp enough to save the bowl, but some porridge had spattered onto her skirt and shoes and, long story short, she left the cell in no particular mood to coddle a prisoner who obviously did not want coddling. Claudia has never been much of a coddler, at any rate. Soren says it’s because she has the heart and metabolism of a saber-toothed manticore. He’s wrong of course, though Claudia does have a jawbone and several hairs from the mane of one. But she had appreciated the thought anyway!   
  
Still, the prisoner hasn’t eaten in two days now, and letting her starve to death won’t solve anything; her father had been pleased that she’d managed to take one of the assassins alive, so Claudia probably better try to keep her that way. Father is already grumpy enough as it is with General Amaya stomping right and left through the castle halls.   
  
This time, instead of porridge, she prepares a tray of brown bread, cheese, and apple slices - the sort of food that won’t spatter and make a mess on her clothes if it’s spilled. The glass of water is still a risk, she supposes, but at least it won’t stain.   
  
The cell is quiet when she unlocks the door and steps inside. The elf sits motionless where Claudia had left her, eyes closed and fingers unclenched in the cuffs that keep them strung up above her head. She looks exhausted.   
  
Her eyes fly open as Claudia walks closer, however.   
  
“Good morning,” Claudia says brightly, bending to set the tray at her feet. “Are you feeling hungry yet?”  
  
The elf doesn’t reply, just stares at Claudia with suspicion scrawled across every inch of her face.   
  
“I brought breakfast,” Claudia adds unnecessarily, settling down cross-legged in front of the prisoner - carefully out of reach of her feet - and gesturing at the tray of food. “Do you think you can manage to get some down your throat this time instead of spilled all over my second-favorite dress?”  
  
The elf continues to glare at her. “I’m not hungry.” Her stomach chooses this moment to let out an enormous growl that echoes around the stone room.  
  
Claudia puts a hand to her mouth as she giggles, watching a hot flush creep across the elf’s tattooed cheeks. “You sure about that?”  
  
The elf turns her head away without speaking, though the blush doesn’t fade. Claudia sighs, then picks up a slice of the bread and takes a big, dramatic bite. “Mmmm,” she mumbles loudly through her full mouth, letting her eyes flutter closed for effect. “Baked fresh this morning. Delicious!”  
  
Then she cracks open one eye. The elf is scowling and glaring down at her boots instead of Claudia’s face now. She looks…hungry.  
  
“You sure you don’t want to try?” Swallowing, Claudia holds the other end of the slice up to the elf’s mouth and brushes the crust against her lips, which stay firmly closed. “Just one teensy little nibble? It’s not poisoned, I swear! For one thing, you literally just saw me eat a bite, and for another, there are sooo many easier ways to poison someone than baking it into a loaf of bread. I mean, I don’t even know how to bake.” But the elf keeps her mouth shut tight and turns her head away.   
  
“Ugh, fine.” Exasperated, Claudia drops the bread back onto the tray. “Well if you’re not going to eat, you at least have to drink some water. Your throat must be pretty dry by now.”   
  
“I don’t have to do anything.”  
  
“Oh, really?” Claudia sits back on her heels and makes a show of looking brightly around the cell. “I didn’t realize this was a voluntary visit! Wow, and here I’ve been thinking of you as,” she brings up her hands for the scare quotes, “‘the prisoner’ all this time. I’ll just go tell my dad you’ve been here of your own free will all along.”  
  
“You do that,” the elf agrees. “Take these chains off while you’re at it, and I’ll show you some proper elvish gratitude for the hospitality.”  
  
“Hm…” Claudia pretends to think it over, then breaks into a grin. “Nah, I don’t think so. Nice try though!”  
  
The elf huffs, then looks away again, as if embarrassed by her own brief flash of humor. Claudia gets the sense that moonshadow elf assassins aren’t supposed to make a lot of jokes after being caught on the job and chained up in a cell, even if the joke is at their captor’s expense. Does that mean Claudia wins this round? Eh…she’ll count it as one, anyway.     
  
“Okay, ready for your water?” She holds the cup to the elf’s mouth, then tips it slightly forward. The elf’s eyes narrow, and her lips press together more firmly than ever. Claudia rolls her eyes and tilts it further forward. A trickle of water spills down the elf’s chin and trails along her neck. “Come on, open up! I don’t have all day, you kow.”  
  
But the elf is even stubborner than Claudia had given her credit for. A few minutes’ effort later, about half the contents of the cup have soaked into the prisoner’s shirt, but as far as Claudia can tell not a single drop has made it down her throat.   
  
“Fine,” Claudia snaps at last, irritation making her movements jerky as she drops the cup back onto the tray and climbs sharply to her feet. “Stay thirsty, then. We’ll see if you’re still feeling this stubborn tomorrow.” She turns to go.  
  
“…wait.”  
  
Claudia glances back over her shoulder, raising an eyebrow. “Yes?”  
  
The elf looks even more tired now than when she had entered the cell. She holds her head high regardless, shaking greasy strands of hair from her eyes as she fixes Claudia with that hard violet stare. “The egg,” she says at last, after a moment of visible hesitation. “What have you done with it?”  
  
“That’s really none of your concern.”  
  
“Is it safe? It hasn’t…it hasn’t been harmed?”  
  
Claudia pauses at the door, then shrugs. “Eat something tomorrow, and maybe I’ll tell you.”   
  
…  
  
Claudia finds her father in his study, standing by the window and frowning as he leafs through a thick leather-bound book. Like pretty much everyone else she’s spoken to today, he looks tired. It’s starting to feel like a theme.   
  
“Hey Dad,” she says, pushing the door gently closed behind her. “How are things with the general?” She knows that he had a meeting with General Amaya that morning; judging from the look on his face, it…probably could have gone better.   
  
“Amaya is principled as ever.” Her father lets out a small sigh, and flips the book closed. “She has never been the easiest woman to work with.”  
  
“Anything I can do to help?”  
  
“Not at the moment, no. I am afraid that Amaya is a complication I will have to solve myself.” He gives her a small smile to soften the dismissal. “Have you changed the combination for the secret passage?”  
  
“Uh-huh!” Claudia reaches into her pocket and pulls a folded scrap of paper, then hands it over to him. “Here’s the new code. Don’t worry, that’s the only copy.”  
  
“Very good,” he says absently, looking the note over. “It’s unfortunate that the princes know the location now…the egg will have to be moved out of the workroom for safekeeping, as soon I can find the appropriate hiding place for it. One more chore for the list…any news on the prisoner, by the way?”  
  
“She still hasn’t eaten anything,” Claudia admits with a frown. “But I think I know something that might work tomorrow.”  
  
“Well, keep me updated. If you’ve made no progress by then, perhaps it’s time I stepped in myself.”  
  
A tiny flicker of unease shoots up Claudia’s spine at his words, though she can’t quite put into words why. It’s just that Father’s methods can be so…permanent. Not that it matters when it comes to bloodthirsty elven assassins, of course, but…well, there’s no harm in taking your time once in a while, right? And Claudia’s gut is telling her to this is one of those times. That, or she’s catching the greenleaf influenza again, but Claudia’s pretty sure it’s the first one. Like, seventy percent sure.  
  
But all she does is shrug and nod her head.   
  
“One more thing, Claudia,” he says after a moment, his eyes harder than they had been before. “It seems that Prince Callum has informed Amaya that I have the dragon king’s egg in my possession.” Claudia feels her heart sink a little at the words. She had told Callum not to tell anyone, she had told him. Why hadn’t he just listened to her in first place? “I denied it, of course, but the general remains…suspicious. Should she speak to you about it, I informed her that we have been examining astralis gryphon eggs as part of your studies. The princes must have mistaken it for a dragon egg when they were breaking into my workroom - without, I might add, any adult supervision or permission.”  
  
“Ooh, good thinking,” Claudia says, grateful for the change in subject. “Hey, maybe we should get a real astralis gryphon egg to show her!” Starbright gryphons only nest at the top of remote Xadian mountainpeaks once every ten years, but Claudia’s pretty sure that she and Soren could find one if they just put their backs into it. Plus, she’s always loved treasure hunts!   
  
“Not your worst idea,” her father says after a moment, sounding distracted. “But I’m afraid we don’t have time for treasure hunts right now.” It’s really creepy when he reads her mind like that. Claudia loves her dad, but sometimes she wishes he was a little less…just less sharp all the time, you know? Like a butter knife, instead of a razor. She wonders what it’s like to have a butter knife as a father. It sounds kind of peaceful. But would that make her and Soren the butter? “Let’s keep that one on the back burner for the moment.”  
  
“Okay,” she says, trying to clear the image of a human-sized butter knife dressed up in Dad’s robes and lecturing her on the principles of dark magic from her mind. It takes an effort. “Uh, was there anything else?”  
  
“No.” He’s already looking back down at the book on his desk, eyes clouding over with thoughts that Claudia is pretty sure have nothing to do with their current conversation. Luckily, Claudia can sympathize with that particular struggle. It’s probably for the best that her dad isn’t a giant butter knife, after all. “No, that’s all for now.”   
  
“Okay,” she says again, even though he’s definitely not listening now, and slips out the door. Her father doesn’t watch her go.   
  



End file.
